When an inmate makes a telephone call from a facility, the call must be answered by a person who chooses to accept the call, typically by dialing a single digit in response to voice prompts. This restriction means that inmates are able to contact outside people only if the inmates' and outsiders' schedules coincide. If a voicemail system or answering machine picks up the incoming call, the call is not accepted, and the inmate has no way to leave a message.
Inmate telephones are shared, and access is usually limited. If inmates are waiting in lines to make calls, an inmate may not be able to try repeatedly to complete a call, waiting for a family member to be in a position to answer the call. Outsiders are unable to make calls to inmates, so, if the outsiders are busy working and the inmate doesn't have access to the outsiders' schedules, the chances of the inmate calling at the right time are limited.
However, contact with friends and family members is an incredibly important part of rehabilitation and reduced recidivism for inmates. There is a direct relationship between access to communication with family and the likelihood of returning to jail for new crimes after release. Families also benefit from regular communication—children of inmates in particular.
The telephones that inmates use are customized for use in correctional facilities. As well as requiring consent from the recipient of a call, the calls are recorded for review by corrections staff, and the numbers that can be called by the inmate are restricted. Changing the ways that these phone systems work or installing additional hardware is expensive and requires cooperation by various contracted organizations. Nonetheless, those who have sought to improve upon the inmate calling experience have focused on the telephone systems in place at the correctional facilities rather than recognizing the possibility of keeping such systems in place and improving upon the experience from the outside.
A practical solution to improve communication for inmates and their families is a system using the existing telephones in facilities with the same security restrictions that are in place, but adding new services such as the ability to make multiple calls in a single connection and to leave messages for people who are unable to answer the phone. Allowing outsiders to call and leave messages for inmates at any time, also greatly eases communication between the two parties.